Climate change is already reversing the hard-earned progress Kenya has made in reducing poverty. The uncertainty of shorter, delayed rainy seasons, and more severe, frequent droughts and floods has increased stress on water supplies and agricultural land, which many people depend on for their livelihoods and food security. Turkana, in the north of Kenya, is especially affected by extreme weather events.
Persons with disabilities are impacted by the situation even more acutely. We are already exposed to additional limiting socioeconomic factors, including difficulty engaging in business, gaining employment, and accessing services due to physical infrastructure. The changing climate exacerbates these factors to the extent of livelihood failure.
This is especially the case in rural areas, where we mainly depend on rain-fed agriculture either directly, through subsistence farming, or indirectly, through employment. When I had the accident which caused my disability, my family – who depended solely on casual farm labour for income – were severely squeezed financially. This was not just because of the expense of my disability, but also because of farms’ reduced yield, which drove up food prices, and reduced the number of agricultural jobs.
One way to support persons with disabilities in the face of climate-related vulnerabilities is through social protection. Currently, Kenya distributes the Persons with Severe Disabilities Cash Transfer (PWSD-CT) to meet basic needs and combat extreme poverty among people with severe disabilities. The PWSD-CT is allocated to people who i) have a ‘severe’ disability and ii) are in extreme poverty. However this limits who can receive the funds significantly; for example, because I have prostheses I don’t qualify for the benefit as my disability is not considered to be severe.
Climate risks and vulnerabilities are increasingly compromising such poverty reduction measures, and threatening people with destitution. This is in part because the Kenyan national social protection policy inhibits people from benefiting from more than one cash transfer progamme, such as those responding to climate change.
The PWSD-CT is 2000 Kenyan shillings (around 17USD) per month. But people with severe disabilities face vulnerabilities and additional costs of living that are often higher than those receiving cash transfers from other transfers. In Northern Kenya, for instance – a region which experiences severe drought – people with severe disabilities receive less from the PWSD-CT than people without disabilities who qualify for the Hunger Safety Net Programme, a cash transfer programme responding to drought-related shock (2700 Kenyan shillings/25 USD per month). PWSD-CT should be redesigned to account for the risks and vulnerabilities caused by climatic shocks so that people don’t lose out.
People with severe disabilities face two social protection needs – health and consumption – and climate change adds to those missed earning, which can be the result of lost jobs due to extreme weather events. The PWSD-CT is too low to meet consumption and health needs, in addition to smoothing climate-induced impacts (Abdille, 2019). According to Merttens’ (2018) evaluation of HSNP, safety nets against droughts are mostly used for consumption smoothing. Thus, people reduce or cut back altogether on essential costs such as health services, school and food as a coping mechanism to mitigate climate change impacts.
In the short term, the simplest solution would be to increase the value and broaden the eligibility criteria of the PWSD-CT. In the long term, enhancing people’s capacity to deal with climate change impacts and the challenges they present to their livelihoods will also be key.
References
Abdille, I. K. & Mbutaru, P. (2019). Cash Transfer and the Economic Well-Being of Persons with Severe Disability in Wajir County, Kenya. International Journal of Current Aspects, Volume 3, Issue III. Pp 135-153. Retrieved from http://journals.ijcab.org/journals/index.php/ijcab/article/view/36 on 31/12/2021.
Groce et al. (2011). Disability and Poverty: The Need for a More Nuanced Understanding of Implications for Development Policy and Practice. Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Retrieved from https://www.jstor.org/stable/41300297 on 31/12/2021.
Merttens et al., (2018). Evaluation of the Kenya Hunger Safety Net Programme Phase 2: Impact evaluation final report. Oxford Policy Management. Oxford, UK.
Peter Muraya is a recipient of the Krystle Kabare Scholarship Scheme. He was recently elected as a member of Nakuru ward’s climate change planning committee. All views are the author’s own.